Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to Raisingautism. We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
What is woo?
Topic Started: Jul 3 2009, 10:02 AM (241 Views)
LeitiaRaven
Member Avatar
The Techie Woo Fighting Warrior Princess
Woo is pseudoscience: theories, ideas, products that don't stand up to scientific study. Homeopathy is woo. Reiki is woo. Chakras and crystals (although lovely for meditation and pretty to look at, respectively) are woo. Dang it.

Folks will draw the line on what is woo at different places, so don't worry if your line is drawn differently from ours. And some woo is entirely harmless. Our beef is with dangerous woo.

For example, the GFCF diet has no good studies showing it to be effective, but as long as it's a well-rounded diet where children get enough calcium, even if there's no reason to suspect a milk or wheat protein allergy, it doesn't hurt to try it. It costs a lot, it's hard to do, and the stuff tastes like cardboard, but there's no harm in trying it. So maybe not woo, or if woo, as studies are done in the future and we get the results of current studies, harmless woo. There's no doubt if there's an allergy or intolerance that it's going to help.

Woo is also the technique of sellings one's ideas using dishonest techniques such as:

Anecdotes that play on the fear and worry of a parent

Misrepresentation of data to imply results that are false

Promotion of products and/or techniques that are scientifically discredited and in some cases cause harm.

Promoting mistrust of health officials by way of dramatization and emotional non factual content

Using correlation to prove causation

Use of studies that have been proven falsified to inflame the public

Offering 'cures' for something that is not curable.

Conspiracy based beliefs used to bully parents

There are many persons and organizations out there that are playing on parents fears and concerns to capitalize (to generate huge profits) by offering false hope, encouraging people to view autistic persons as 'broken, persons of no value, shadows" etc, encouraging parents to feel like victims.

Everyone has their own definition of what woo is. In our opinion if diet restrictions, vitamins, aromatherapy, massage etc help you and your child GREAT!! But we truly have to draw the line at anything that costs a high amount of money and relies on fear mongering and dishonest 'studies' to promote a product.
And
we will NOT tolerate organizations that encourage dangerous treatments that have no scientifically proven results and/or have dangerous repercussions for the 'patient'.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
« Previous Topic · Is this Woo? · Next Topic »
Add Reply

Free Domains Hosting at .co.nr